Why does God let horrible things happen to his devout followers?

Question

I would love to believe in God, Heaven, Jesus, etc. but recently my faith has been questioned as my girlfriend has had brain surgery and my Grandpa is close to death after a long, painful bout with cancer. Both of them were lifelong devout christians. Why should I believe in a God who does this to his "flock". And please, none of that "it's part of his grand plan" crap. Creating a world with terrorism, poverty, AIDS, and moral corruptness does not seem to be part of a master plan to me.

Answer 1

I wish I had an answer for you, I'd like to know the answer to that one too. I grew up in church but I "fell away from God" when I got tired of all the hypocrisy in church. People who come every Sunday and praise the Lord and preach about all the things we shouldn't do....right after they stood outside and talked sh*t about the people they go to church with, or they're watching the clock, can't wait to get out the door. There are alot of unanswered questions about God. I'd love to believe in him, it's just so hard though when you see bad things happening to yourself and the people you love.
I don't believe it's karma what's happened to the people you love. I know that God created the world and humans to be perfect until Adam and Eve f*cked everything up. And you also have to remember....there's the Devil too.
Supposedly we're in the last days, which are supposed to be horrible and corrupted with evil. Just like people die for their country when they go to war, maybe some people die for their God when they fight in the war between good and evil.
I really don't know. I haven't had answers about God in a very long time.

Answer 2

God does not let horrible things happen, we here on the planet Earth do! Does you own earth Father let things happen or do you go and do them because you are unintelligent, immature or just lack the intellect or experience to do what is right. We all make mistakes and learn from them....of course it appears that you need someone to blame...but then again you lack understanding of the bigger picture....the good, the bad and the ugly all go in the same box when the game is over.....I would sooner live life and believe there was a god and find out when I die that there was not...than to live life as if there was no God then die and find out there was....If you do not want to believe...no matter your following...that is your choice....read a few history books...life is better now than it ever was...the difference is global communication makes it more visible than it was 100 years ago. Good luck to you. I am sorry about your Father and you partner...my son died in a car accident two years ago and he was 32. My Mother died just a few weeks ago from a massive heart attack.....I sure as Heavens hope there is a God to look after them now...I surely do!

Answer 3

Sorry for your hardships but perhaps you can get off that high cloud that your looking down on everyone from and realize that we are all created equally. Sure your bitter your sad and crying and yelling at the sky and blaming God for all that is wrong and how it doesn't make sense. But that just life. Sorry bad things happen to the most devoted persons and also to the ones that never held a bible in their hands and read from it. The only difference is that when a "bad" person dies a painful death everyone thinks if not says it out loud "well they had it coming". I really blame it on society and our belief system that some how we instill it in our minds generation to generation that good people are rewarded for good and bad people with bad. That's just a lie. I'm sorry this probably didn't help but I think there is some truth to what I've responded with.

Answer 4

It is hard to keep faith about anything. Don't give up what you believe in because bad things happen. Have you lately counted out all the good things in your life that happen. You did meet and fall in love with you girlfriend. How would it be if you never meet her. Would you give her up, if you knew that down the road she needed brain surgery. Think of all the good times you had with your grandpa. You can't have something good with out the bad. Maybe your grandpa suffering is a way to make him closer to God before he dies. You don't really know what God intends. The only thing you can do is go with the flow. Be there for the ones that need you the most right now. Your things about why bad things happen with like terrorism, proverty, aids, moral corruptness. If life was perfect and there was no bad in the world. We would probably walking around like mindless sheeps. So that people could not create all the bad things on earth. God created people. But I have never heard them say god created our mind and spirt. Therefore we have the freedom to think and do as we will. Just some people are the bad egg in the nest. Don't give up yet. Soon it will change for you. It is hard to stay with your faith when bad times hit. Yet when good times are around it is easy.

Answer 5

God gave men the ability of freewill. From that can come great things and also can come destructive things. Is it always easy to understand? No.
Sometimes to truly make an impact on others and inspire them God uses people to overcome serious sufferings to help others. What I have learned over the years is just because I do whats right doesnt always mean right things will happen to me.
Thats why its called faith. If things always went our way over and over again our need for God would diminish.
Think of times when you werent your best or going through some very tough times. Didnt it mean something that some people were in your corner no matter what?
Every human on earth has gone through something tough and hard to explain. Sometimes..we wont get the answer to the why's till much later in life. And sometimes maybe not in this life..
Focus on the time you have spent with your grandpa. Others have NEVER seen or met their grandparents. Focus on the fact that your girlfriend is still alive. Many are born with things that are never able to be corrected. So you have had times to talk,take a walk.See the sunrise/sunset..heard the ocean with her. Others have never even had a girlfriend.
I can relate to you...

Answer 6

I do not mean to be insensitive in any way, but I believe that there is a reason behind everything. I see that people suffer unfairly, and it saddens me and brings many questions to mind. But I do not know the answer to your question, but maybe someday I will understand after I myself am dead and gone, but for now- I do not understand I many times feel very angry and sad and somewhat hopeless and helpless.
Sometimes it just seems that horrible evil things happen to ourselves and others with no explanation and there seems to be no excuse for the suffering and pain that is experienced in life.
And what gets to me the most is that the people who suffer the most are the innocent ones...what about the 2 or 3 month old babys who are sexually abused or beaten to death. How horribly unfair. But I still believe in GOD and I believe in heaven and I hope that heaven is what it has been written to be...a place where there is no more suffering.
I wish you the best and GOD bless you, I know life is hard, and I have been through so much myself. Keep your faith and keep on keeping on.

Answer 7

The master plan is the Bible. Once Adam and Eve left the garden the world was condemned. Remember, our lives are what they are....free will and all.

God does not do this to his flock. God merely watches the world unfold the way it is unfolding. Diseases were unleashed on the world long ago (post Eden), and are indiscriminate..striking the good and the bad. If your Grandpa and your girlfriend are Christians and have sought the Lord faithfully, then they have secured for themselves an eternal life in heaven. If you want to be with them in an afterlife, then you need to worry about your eternal life and walk with God.

As for your girlfriend and Grandpa, all you can do is pray vigorously for them and pray that it is God's will to help them through this difficult time. If God choses to take them from this world into the next, then mourn for them, then be happy for them...knowing they are in a better place...then STRIVE to MEET them.

Answer 8

It is not that God "lets" bad things happen to good people (His devout followers) but rather that, God gives us a free will to choose what ever we want to choose, good or evil. If He did not give us a free will we would be His puppets.

Because man has a free will, some men choose to do evil things, for example rape, murder, stealing, etc. A person's choice to do evil ALWAYS impacts someone else, usually a totally innocent person.

God did not create an imperfect world and He certainly did not create cancer, poverty AIDS, etc - those are the direct result of sin, and sin is the free will choice of man. When faced with the decision to do evil (for example to steal something we really want) we have a free choice: steal it or not. If we steal it, that impacts the store owner, the employees, the consumers, the legal system, and it especially impacts the person who stole it, whether they will admit it or not.

Diseases such as cancer are sometimes due to our own free choice for example, smoking. Now, my father in-law recently died of cancer and he never smoked a day in his life, He was a devote Christian and a very good man. But he died! despite everyone praying for him, he died! But do you know what, we are all going to die of something, sometime.

In the Bible there is a story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. Lasarus' sisters came up to Jesus crying because Lazarus died, and Jesus had compassion on them and raised Lazarus from the dead. There are several other accounts of Jesus raising someone from the dead too. But do you know what, those people aren't alive today - they all still died later.

Sickness and disease came into the world as the result of sin, and we have to live (or die) with that. It was not God's plan! One day that will change - one day soon. But until then, we must remain faithful and trust God in those areas we cannot comprehend yet.

Answer 9

If you look throughout history, you see that many faithful followers did not have the easy road. Read the book of Job. He lost everthing, got leprosy, and had friends who told him it was all his fault, yet he still refused to curse God and die.

Look at the cross. Was that very fair that the very sinless Son of God should have to go through such a tortorous humiliation in order to pay for the sins of others?

I can relate somewhat to your pain. My wife and I are both Christians, yet we both lost our fathers on the same day two hours apart (separate incidents, different hospitals which were 40 miles apart) back three years ago this July. Her father was only 57, and his death could have been avioided had his doctor listened to what he was trying to tell him six months prior, and examined him for kidney cancer, but refused to do so. Yet, my wife and mother-in-law refuse to be bitter toward this physician.

I don't have all the answers, but I do know this much. God is sovereign, and many of his faithful followers have gone through hard times! When we consider the fact that he hasn't dropped any or all of us dead for our disobedience (we all sin) the question really should be why does God allow us to take our next breath when we act the way we do?

Answer 10

You are the result of ever decision you ever made. Placing blame on a supernatural being is an easy way to escape this responsability.

Most Christians don't allow a vengeful God to do bad things.. they blame it on Satan.

I believe the Universe speaks much louder and with greater clarity. If most people would stop asking "why God" and start searching for the reality of "Truths" in their own personal lives then questions like yours would be answered easy and without hesitation.

I can not answer your question. I can empathize with you and try to understand your suffering.

I am a Reiki Master. Reiki teaches that there is an illusion of suffering that halts the growth process. I will try to explain this simply.

If you asked 5 people what the "worst" day in their lives were you would get 5 different answers. The illusion is this, regardless of whether 1 person's worst day was loosing their home, and another person's day was loosing a loved one, the "feelings" and the "emotions" that all 5 experienced were exactly the same.

If you look at life through this simple lens, you can feel greater love and more compassion knowing that "suffering" is a Universal fact of life, and that regardless of the actual cause, the emotions and feelings that come with suffering are the same for all.

In Love

Nameste.

Answer 11

I know what that feels like, I am a Christian and I lost Both of my Grandmothers to Cancer like your family and girlfriend they were Christian, I also lost an aunt and a cousin, and all this in the same year. It is very hard when you lose someone or someone you love is suffering, and you ask God why, but sometimes these trials are to make us stronger in Christ and when God decides it is someones time to go, it is because their purpose on this earth has been fulfilled, my consolation is that I know that I will see them again some day when the Lord comes and takes his church with him, my other consolation is that they are no longer suffering, and that they no longer have to deal with all the problems we face here on earth. Understand that disease, poverty, corruption, terrorism and other things are all consequences of things that came before us and of things the world does today, and know that his arrival is forthcoming and if you keep strong in the Lord not only will you be rewarded with eternal life, you will also see those Loved ones that died with the Lord.